A Near-Death Experience

    You don't hear much about self-drive cars these days. All the talk now is about electric vehicles.  But I had a near death experience in a self-drive bus about twenty years ago. The administrator of the small rural hospital where I worked was fascinated with the self-drive concept as was the hospital's IT guy who was a true genius. The IT guy, Bryce, developed a self-drive apparatus for the hospital bus. He and the administrator, Mr. Jacobs, secretly tested their self-drive system on the gravel roads in the surrounding country.

   One Thursday morning in the early nineties I showed up early at the hospital. Several nurses and I were signed up for a two day conference in a city six hours away. We were all surprised to find Mr. Jacobs sitting in the driver's seat of the bus. This was most unusual because Mr. Jacobs always went to administrator's conferences in Florida or Hawaii. It was then he revealed that the bus was a self-driving vehicle. He said he and Bryce had made the trip to the city a half dozen times in the past year and had worked out all the bugs. This would be the first trial with passengers.

   We were waiting for Bryce to show up when Mr. Jacobs got a call on his bag phone. Bryce was sick and wouldn't be able to come with us.  Mr. Jacobs said we'd be fine without him. Mr. Jacobs sat in the driver's seat, but let the self-drive system control the bus. It worked perfectly. Once we got on the freeway closer to the city Mr. Jacobs came back and sat with us. "The freeway is the easy part," he said. The nurses and I looked at each other uneasily. One of the nurses said, "Mr. Jacobs, shouldn't someone stay in the driver's seat just in case?"

   Mr. Jacobs brushed her off. He was clearly elated with the bus's performance. "We plan to license Bryce's system and the hospital will be able to expand with the added income," he said. Right after saying  this, he clutched his chest and slumped to the floor. As soon as that happened, the bus slowed, pulled into the breakdown lane and stopped. The nurses started working on Mr. Jacobs. One of them knew how to use the bag phone and called 911.

   An ambulance from St. Bonaventure Hospital soon arrived and took Mr. Jacobs away. Our conference was at this same hospital so we planned to drive the bus there. Suddenly, the bus door closed and the bus pulled out into traffic. I got in the driver's seat but the bus was under the control of the self-drive system. The bus cruised past the exit to St. Bonaventure, keeping up with traffic.

  None of the nurses' suggestions to shut off the bus worked. I couldn't even get the four way flashers to come on. One of the nurses called 911 again and explained our situation. Soon highway patrol cruisers were in front and behind us. The one in front gradually slowed and the bus slowed as well. Soon cruisers were in all four lanes, gradually slowing until all traffic on the freeway was stopped.

   A trooper told me to pop the hood and he disconnected the battery. Soon a wrecker arrived to haul the bus away and the troopers dropped us off at the hospital. Mr. Jacobs was doing ok but did not want any visitors. I went to my conference, but didn't get anything out of it which was not atypical. 

   Next day we rented a van and drove home. I kept badgering Bryce in his lair until he came clean. He was proud that the bus pulled over when Mr. Jacobs lost consciousness, but admitted the GPS in the bus had been mistakenly set for the St. Bonaventure Rollerdrome in another city. 

  The hospital paid a hefty fine to the state which agreed to keep the self-drive fiasco quiet. The nurses and I received nice "bonuses" to keep mum and no more was heard about licensing Bryce's system. Everyone involved in the bus ride is now either dead or retired so I see no harm in releasing my story in this remote corner of the web. According to google stats, my blog only has four regular readers, one of whom I know because he always leaves a comment. The other three I suspect are bots.

It was an OJ kind of day.